Appendix I An Interpretation of the Modest Chariclea from the Lips of Philip the Philosopher
This translation is based on Hercher's text (see "Works Cited: Ancient Authors"), but I have incorporated some of the emendations and re marks of August Brinkmann ("Beiträge zur Kritik und Erklärung des Dialogs Axiochos," p. 443, n. 1). The marginal numbers refer to the pages of Hercher's edition.
382 One day I was going out the gate of Rhegium that leads to- ward the sea, and when I had reached the spring of Aphrodite, I heard a voice shouting and calling me by name. When I turned around to see where it was coming from, I saw Nikolaos the royal scribe running down toward the sea with Andreas, Phi- letas's son. They were both very dear friends, and I decided to give up my walk and go to meet them.
When we came together, Nikolaos said with a gentle smile, "I'm surprised at you. Are you so indifferent that you allow un- bridled tongues to attack the words of wisdom? Around the outer gates of the temple there is a great encampment of lovers of literature reading Chariclea's book, and most of them are treating it scornfully and subjecting it to mockery and ridicule. Lover of Chariclea that I am, I am hurt by this and, by your wisdom, I entreat you not to let the modest girl be insulted, but rather to call to her defense 'your wit and your gentleness' [ Od . 11.202-3] and to show these babbling quacks that the story of Chariclea is beyond all reproach!"
383 "That's a strange demand, my friend," I said, "going to winter for spring flowers and to hoary old age for the play-
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things of childhood. We left these things behind, the milk, as it were, of our infant education, when we reached the philo- sophic time of life and went on to live in the temples of divine truth. At this point, we have been drawn away from them to the specific forms and language of the philosophy that fits our time of life. Descriptions and tales of love are in harmony with youth and early manhood. Neither gray old souls nor infant souls ex- perience this divine love, but only those of young men and of men in the prime of life, if we can put our faith in the mystical song that goes,
Therefore do the virgins love thee
[Song of Sol. 1.3],
since this is the only age of man that has room for the arrows of love. Well, since the sage said, 'Even graybeards play, but the games are solemn,' let us play our part in the solemn mode and venture a bit beyond the meditations of the philosopher and turn to the erotic palinode.[1] Even Socrates the wise, who was contemplative in every other respect, still, sitting in the shade of the chaste-tree with lovely Phaedrus, amused the young man with talk of love. Let us do it, both for your sakes and for the sake of truth herself!"
We went off and found our friends in a throng before the gates of the temple, waiting for us. After the appropriate prayers to the virgin goddess, I spoke to them, sitting in a low chair right next to the threshold of the temple gate, and began thus:
"This book, my friends, is very much like Circe's brew: those who take it in a profane manner, it transforms into licen- tious pigs, but those who approach it in a philosophical way, in the manner of Odysseus, it initiates into higher things. The book is educational and teaches ethics by mixing the wine of contemplation into the water of the tale.
"Since the human race is divided into male and female and 384 there are independent capacities for good and evil in each, the book shows us both, one beside the other, bearing witness to the virtue and vice of each sex, and displaying serious men in Calasiris, Theagenes, and Hydaspes, and serious women in
[1] This entire passage refers to Plato's Phaedrus , where Socrates evokes the story of Simonides' palinode to Helen in order to explain the necessity of his delivering a second speech to apologize for slandering love (242e-243b).
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Persina and Chariclea. It presents more women and less men as famed for evil since there is more evil dispersed among the race of women. Calasiris teaches you reverence for the divine and how you must turn aside the plots of enemies and right- fully avoid criminal violence, while defending yourself against those who adopt it, and how to use falsehood as you would use a drug, when you are determined to come to the aid either of friends or of yourselves, neither harming your neighbor nor pledging a falsehood in violation of an oath, but rather how to manage your words with wisdom and to be careful and pleas- ing in your speech—this, along with every kind of thoughtful- ness, for he is very graceful in what he says, very judicious in his acts, and very resourceful in difficulties and misfortune. He also teaches self-restraint in fleeing Rhodopis, as does Knemon fleeing the illicit love of Demainete. Most of all, however, The- agenes and Chariclea are models of self-restraint, he by acting with restraint toward the woman he loves and refusing to give in to Arsace, who is insanely in love with him, either when she fawns on him or when she has him whipped. For her part, Chariclea was so clothed in self-restraint that she avoided inter- course with her lover even in dreams and fantasies.
"Let these two also be a fine example to us with regard to justice, when they judge wealth taken from the spoils of battle inviolable, and let Hydaspes be a similar example, defeating the enemy by bravery and good fortune, while he defended those near to him out of justice. The lovers themselves likewise demonstrate bravery, constantly falling upon bitter fortune, yet 385 never allowing their spirits to be dragged down or exhibiting slavish behavior. Thus the book has been shown to be what we may call an archetypal portrait of the four general virtues.[2]
"In presenting those who live blameworthy lives, it both puts upon evil the name it deserves and describes the end to which it leads. For the story itself cries out! The very letters all but speak! If someone scorns justice and contrives to accumu- late a surfeit of undeserved wealth, the misfortunes of Trachi- nus and Pelorus and the shepherds will win him over. If some- one is contriving trickery against his neighbor, let him consider
[2]
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Thisbe with the sword of Thamyris driven through her, and Cybele herself who brewed her own destruction, and the ful- fillment of what Hesiod said:
He who contrives evil for another contrives evil for his own heart [ Op . 265].
Likewise, if some woman should wish to deceive her husband, let her consider the loves of Arsace that ended in her shameful strangling. If one should become a conspirator against kings, like Achaemenes, he may not escape the Ethiopian spear, and do not be forgetful like Oroöndates, lest you be shamefully de- feated. Rather, even when you are treated unjustly, be content with the anomalies of chance and bear them nobly, suffering with Theagenes and Chariclea, so that your end may be rich and prosperous.
"Thus our discussion has led us within the gates of the story as we have articulated its capacity for moral instruction,[3] and lifted off the maiden's resplendent robe (in which she had been clothed on account of those who contrive against her), revealing the holy chiton beneath. Now it is time for this as well to take wing and for her beauty to be revealed without intermediary!
"Chariclea is a symbol of the soul and of the mind that sets the soul in order, for 'fame'
and 'grace'
are (re- spectively) mind, and soul united with it. Moreover, this is not the only reason that her name is a synthesis. It is also because the soul is united
with the body and becomes a single substance with it. You can understand this more clearly 386 if you count the elements of the name and establish their num- ber as 7, or 70, or 700.[4] Since the seventh is a secret number, virgin and august
among numbers, as the language of the Italians explains [by giving it the name septem ], it is fitting that the meaning of 7 is maintained on the levels of monads,
[3][4]
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decads, and hecatontads. The reverent and the perfect are indi- cated by 700, the soul itself by 70, causing that which is tripar- tite to be brought into order by the four perfect virtues, since four decads plus three decads equals 70. Seven itself represents the body, to which mind is attached, which holds in the middle of the soul the pentad of the senses and the matter and form through which it came to be.
"Chariclea was born among the Ethiopians, for man comes forth out of the invisible as if out of darkness into the light, and proceeds to life in this world as she is taken to Greece. Cha- ricles, the active life, raises her, teaching her to assault the pas- sions with her arrows and to be the handmaiden of bravery and self-restraint—that is, of Artemis, for Artemis is both an archer and a virgin. If these two (Charicles and Chariclea) have vir- tually the same name, do not be disturbed at this: practical vir- tue is likewise fitting for the soul itself and procures grace and fame for it.
"However, when she has left the yoke of oxen that has borne her and, bearing her torch, she has reached the temple and catches sight of Theagenes, she forgets everything and entirely engulfs the one she longs for, silently, in her soul. Understand what this riddle is saying to you! When the soul transcends the material dyad, she catches sight of the mind that lies outside of us and that approaches the knowledge of the divine. This leads her upward to the contemplation of her true family and seems lovely to her, and takes up the torch of desire, injecting into her the love of the highest wisdom. Filled with this love and drunk with a sober drunkenness—carried away, so to speak, by love— 387 she scorns her former habits, utterly unmindful of her body, and her thought tends only toward her beloved. Thus, carried off by the one she desires, she rushes to grasp her primal no- bility of birth, and she who had previously been serious and scorned love throws herself willingly at Theagenes.
"Artemis does not prevent her being carried away, but holds back when she sees her virgin temple-servant receiving the wound of love. Old Calasiris escorts the bride, orderly in word and deed. This would be the teacher who draws the soul to the good and leads it to initiation into the knowledge of the divine, and he will be a good counselor in practical things, leading the soul in a state of calm through the salt sea and the waves of life.
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If Trachinus, the harsh
rebellion of the emotions, plots against her, the good counsel of Calasiris will stand against him.
"How long will he be her fellow traveler and companion? Until she passes through the Egypt of ignorance. Her teacher will leave her when she has already advanced and escaped the sea and forgotten the plots of thieves, since the soul rejoices in conversing in private with her beloved.
"Carnal pleasure
in the form of Arsace plots against her, with Cybele for her pimp, representing the senses, who conceives the weapons for the assaults,[5] showers logic with arrows, and draws contemplation to herself in order to debauch the thoughts of the mind. Here let the strong will be made yet tougher! Let it be cast into the fiery furnace of temptation! The ruby
will keep her unblemished, for the 'ruby' is that which 'fears all'
or 'is afraid' and hints at the fear of god, since god is all things
If the pimp brews up a destructive plot of false accusa- tion, she, rather, will be destroyed: those who plot against 388 others become the destroyers of themselves. Cybele will die brewing the drug. Arsace will be deprived of her cure and die by the noose. The anguish of the wicked plottings will drive Achaemenes insane, and so he will be killed.
"Spear in hand, the soul will advance toward her own coun- try and be put to trial by fire—for 'the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is' [1 Cor. 3.13]—and, radiant..."[6]
